Addressing Near Record Honey Bee Losses

By Adam Pachl, North American Technical Manager - Bee Health

The 2023-24 US Honey Bee Colony Loss Survey results came out on 12/5, and just like the last several years, they are awful.  

Two big numbers stand out: 55.1%, and 37.3%.  This was the estimated percentage of colonies lost for the entire year (April 1, 2023 through April 1, 2024), and the percentage of colonies lost over that winter (October 1, 2023 through April 1,2024), respectively.  

This is absolutely heartbreaking for all beekeepers.  It means that nearly two out of every five colonies died over the winter, and over half the colonies in the country died over the year.  These are national averages, and there are breakdowns that can be done with commercial/sideline vs. hobbyist and on the state-by-state level, but no matter how you look at it the losses are massive.  The yearly losses are the worst on record, and the winter losses are the 3^rdworst, but only missing the worst on record by 0.4%.  That is astounding, and to me, unacceptable.

I want to put that in perspective for a minute.  Try to think of any other industry where that is acceptable.  What if half of the chickens in our country died in any given year? What if half of the cows died? What if half of the crops grew died? Would we accept that?  If half of the wheat, corn, canola, or any other commodity we tried to grow just didn’t make it to harvest for largely preventable reasons, would we simply say, “Oh well, we’ll try to do better next year”? Why do we keep riding this carousel over and over again?

There are certainly lots of contributing factors to these colony losses.  Harsh weather, pesticide exposure/residues, nutrition, lack of forage, and the stresses of our migratory commercial industry.  But overall, the vast majority of inspectors, researchers, extension agents, and beekeepers themselves will tell you the number one cause of these losses are varroa mites, the diseases they spread, and the management of these pests, or maybe lack of management.  And some of that lack of management comes from lack of good options.

At the root of all of this, to me, is how we treat varroa to begin with.  We let the varroa populations build up, producing more and more mites, damaging more and more bees in our colonies and spreading more and more disease throughout the hive.  And then, when we either can’t take it anymore (or more likely, have removed our supers and are finally able to treat because of the restrictions on most knockdown products), we treat our mites, killing them and making ourselves feel good.  But by that point the damage has already been done.  Our colony is sick and diseased, our winter bees are weak, and in 2023-24 37.3% of our colonies were already doomed.  Who knows how many of those that died early in the year were too weak from the winter before and simply couldn’t recover?

This is one of the most beautiful things about Norroa^TM, which is currently under review at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.  When used appropriately, it prevents mite population build up.  The data is already there from numerous field trials with thousands of colonies to prove it.  And most of our conventional wisdom would suggest that without that population build up, the disease load will be lower, leading to stronger, healthier colonies in the fall and going into winter.  The data already shows Norroa leads to much higher winter survival rates (just over 25% winter loss in 2022-23 after one early season application, when the national average was an estimated 37.4%, the second highest on record).  Right now, we are conducting trials to make recommendations for fall applications. And next summer we plan to do in depth disease trials to show exactly how Norroa impacts the disease load in colonies to further support how you can keep your bees healthy, and most importantly, alive.

We can’t keep doing this over and over again.  Like every other animal industry, we have a responsibility and a duty to take the best care of the creatures we work with to make our living.  Beekeeping isn’t easy, we do this because we have a passion for it, but for this industry to survive something has to change.  Norroa can break this cycle of loss, and the data is there to prove it.  Let’s turn the tide and start making bees healthier now.

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To learn more, contact Adam at norroa@greenlightbio.com.

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